Evolution and Mind/Body Dualism

[Call_of_the_Wild]

Evolution is not trial-and-error. Not even remotely.

It is trial and error. In order for the good stuff to pass on, the old stuff must die...how many prototypes had to die in order to get to the good stuff? Trial and error.

 

[Sapiens]

We have shown you how it is not random yet you persist in repeating that untruth. I have it on good authority that continuing down an erroneous path when you have been shown the truth in not a Christian thing to do.

 

[idav]

It is trial and error. In order for the good stuff to pass on, the old stuff must die...how many prototypes had to die in order to get to the good stuff? Trial and error.

This evolution thing isn't all that great at what it does, 99% of species don't survive extinction. A designer should hopefully have a better track record.

 

[cottage]

This evolution thing isn't all that great at what it does, 99% of species don't survive extinction. A designer should hopefully have a better track record.

Absolutely right! Evolution isn't that great at what it does - if there is an expected outcome. But there is no 'trial and error' or an expected or hoped for outcome since that implies a consciousness, which there isn't with natural selection. On the other hand, if there is consciousness, as in the case of a designer, then the evidence of error is hugely significant and problematic.

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

I don't necessarily find a contradiction in God, apart from the contradiction you make on infinity and making God the exception. Saying he's qualitatively infinite doesn't even make sense and sounds like a way to make it sound valid.

Ok so let me break it down for you again...when I talk about the absurdities of an actual infinite...I mean it in terms of quantity...you can never reach infinity by successive addition (counting 1 by 1), and you can never have an infinite number of things, like baseball cards or marbles. This absurdity is easily demonstrated. But when we talk about God being infinite, it is not in the same way...we mean it in a qualitive since....as God is the ultimate source of power, presence, knowledge, and goodness...with each attribute maxed out to its highest degree..it is the quality of his being, not the quantity....those are two different contexts.

I simply see no evidence for God.

I see plenty of evidence for God, and not just any old God, but the Christian one. The way I look at it, theism is more plausible than naturalism. I just can't believe that inanimate matter suddenly came to life, and began talking, eating, reproducing, and thinking. Not only is there currently no scientific evidence for this (abiogenesis), but defies my intuition.

I think about the big bang singularity...at which there is no life, consciousness, etc...no intelligent design whatsoever...no thoughts, no life...I just cannot get myself to believe that you can go from that...to consciously thinking and living human beings.

I don't have enough faith to believe in the default position (naturalism) if the existence of an IDer is negated.

Yeah, I remember that. Doesn't make God the exception.

God is the exception because the absurdity that comes with an actual infinite quantity of anything doesn't apply to him because it isn't in the same sense that the term is being applied.

You said events come into existence. I said no one can prove that they don't already exist, but are simply in the future. How is that irrelevant?

So, people that aren't as of yet born, but will be born in the future already exist in the future, despite the fact that they are not born yet, but will be in the future?

It has everything to do with what you said. We're talking about traversing events.

Exactly, and events take place in terms of earlier than and later than sequences...at which a natural number can be placed on each event in numerical order...and in order for a distance number/event to be reached, an infinite number/events had to be traversed...

No escape...no matter how you want to dance around it, the absurdity isn't going anywhere. It is like a pimple from hell...no matter how many times you pop it, it just keeps coming back.

So then an infinite God is absurd.

If the argument was that God existed in infinite time, then I would agree, but since that isn't the argument, I don't

You keep talking about traversing time but won't specify what even has to do the traversing and simply respond with "irrelevant".

Looks to me like I just did.

It doesn't arrive. We arrive at it. You even said time isn't the thing that's moving.

I am talking about events in time, and I thought I made that point very clear based on the amount of times I've used the word "events" since we have been having this discussion.

The days don't come pass. You come passed it. If you took a near light speed trip, you would approach the days dramatically faster due to time dilation.

The argument isn't dependent upon time dilation. Infinity cannot be reached or posessed no matter how you view time or the speed of motion.

Who the heck has demonstrated this?! You got an example of an infinite universe that someone used to demonstrate this?

No, but what I have is analogies at which absurdities can be demonstrated, and if it can't happen in an analogy, then it can't happen in reality.

If it makes you feel that good to tell yourself that...

It does. I mean it is simple, and I have to get all of this dancing, stalling, over-analyzing from you and others. This only confirms the argument for what it is, fire-proof.

At least once. Could be more.... an infinite more. Who knows?

Illogical answers like this also confirms...

You've said that already. And I've already said that I don't have to traverse an infinite amount of days to get to the day, regardless if the Universe is infinite or not.

First off, I didn't ask "How many days/seconds would YOU have to traverse"...I asked "how many seconds lead up to this present day". You are not included anywhere in the question, so this is just another clear example of your straw mans.

Do you even know what ERV markers are?

Very little.

So prehistoric whales with tiny hindlegs that are too small to support it's weight, but has all the feet of the bones, like the toes completely intact, mean nothing to you?

So the animal known as a "whale" used to walk on land? A whale cannot survive on land today, can it? So please explain how a whale would evolve a completely different respiratory system to allow it to dwell strickly in water now? Not only how, but why? Why the sudden change? You don't see the trial and error process?

Look how similar basilosaurus and ambulocetus are in skeletal structure. Their skeletons are exactly the same, with the same exact kind of teeth too. Yet ambulocetus' hindlimbs are proportionately longer, indicating that it's a precursor to basilosaurus that walked on land. There's many intermediate forms between these creatures too.

If their skeletons are exactly the same, also the teeth, then one of their hindlimbs wouldn't be longer than the other. Second, any similarities involving anything could very well mean common designer. The designer could make anything creature he want, and there could be differences and similarities with all of them...how is common ancestory any better of a hypothesis than common design??

Question is, why would God lay out the fossil record to make it look like Evolution happened?

It doesn't to me.

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

So discard the conception that it's babble, and actually take the time to learn what we're talking about.

I do know what we're talking about.

Regarding it as babble tells me that you're probably not reading our responses very carefully, by which I mean looking up words you don't understand, taking the time to do quick research on subjects unfamiliar with you, and so forth.

Experiment and observation tells me that an animal will always produce what they are, not what they aren't. I haven't seen anything contrary to this yet...and I doubt if I went back in time that I would see the animals of the past do something that the animals of the present haven't been observed doing.

All of the bio-babble is just used to make the evolutionist appear smart, or knowledgeable.

Or school biology textbooks

Bio-babble is the stuff of bad Star Trek episodes like Genesis or Threshold.

I didn't say it should be discarded from an every-day perspective, which is the pet store situation. There, it's fine to use "kind". I meant scientifically, which requires far more precision.

Does it? Really? What is the difference? It would only require more precision if you assumed evolution. No matter how many categorizations you want to make regarding of animals and their genus, family, species, etc, it will all boil down to the same thing, which is an animal is what it is, and it isn't what it isn't...and it will only produce what it is, not what it isn't. It doesn't matter how many species of dogs you want to call it, it will still be dog, regardless. If you say "that dog A is a different species of dog B", you are still identifying the animal as a "dog", which means that they are the same KIND...they may be a different variety of the same kind, but they are the same kind nevertheless.

After all, what "kinds" are there, and how are they categorized? How do they explain that there ARE very small genetic similarities between dogs and turtles: similarities shared by ALL mammals and reptiles?

Dog kind: wolf, domestic dog, coyote, fox, dingo,jackal
Cat kind: Lion, tiger, cheetah, leopard, domestic cat, jaguar
Bear kind: grizzly, brown, polar, koala
Snake kind: Anaconda, python, boa, rattle, cobra

The list goes on and on and on.

Uh, no I don't. I don't believe that, and nobody even remotely educated on the Tree of Life does. Reptiles don't come from birds at all. It's almost the other way around. I say almost, because dinosaurs are not reptiles. There's every indication that they did, from genetics to the fossil record. All of these point to birds sharing a common ancestor with reptiles.

Ohh, reptiles didn't come from birds? So what the heck do you think the achaeoteryx was, or was "supposed" to be? Where do you the whole theory was behind that whole scam? What do you think the presupposition was behind that scam?? Huh?

It's what the author of Genesis 1 saw, and what he saw is perfectly compatible with evolution.

I find Genesis 1 completely incompatible with the ToE, but to each his own.

There's recently been some discussion that some feathered dinosaurs might have been able to fly. Where's the line, now, between dinosaur and bird? (You can't say teeth; there are some birds still alive today that have them). Like I said before: there are no such hard and fast lines in reality; we create those distinguishing lines for ourselves because humans naturally categorize things.

More fairy tales. I thought the whole "fairy tale" thing was something only distinct to theists?

Besides, break away from animals for a moment. All other forms of life also undergo natural selection: plants, fungus, and so forth. In single-celled organisms, it happens so fast that new species develop from older ones within a few years, and our medicines have to account for that in order to be any good.

Speculation...faith...presuppositions...bio-babble..voodoo

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

This evolution thing isn't all that great at what it does, 99% of species don't survive extinction.

If something is extinct, I don't find it all that surprising that it wouldn't "survive extinction". Apparently you do.

A designer should hopefully have a better track record.

Christians argue that he does.

 

[idav]

If something is extinct, I don't find it all that surprising that it wouldn't "survive extinction". Apparently you do.



Christians argue that he does.

Trial and error gets the job done. If the trial didnt work then it didnt work but if it worked then there is no error to correct. Meaning trial and error can work without having to be intelligent about the process.

 

[Riverwolf]

It is trial and error. In order for the good stuff to pass on, the old stuff must die...how many prototypes had to die in order to get to the good stuff? Trial and error.

That's not how it works at all. Once again, you demonstrate yourself to be firmly in the grasp of the Straw Man's power.

The "good stuff" is whatever works in any given environment, which is always changing. I guarantee humans and dinosaurs could never coexist, not because dinosaurs would eat us all, but because the climate they require to survive is so much hotter than ours. The Earth was slightly closer to the Sun during their time.

 

[Riverwolf]

I do know what we're talking about.

No you don't. You've demonstrated time and time again that you have no idea what we're talking about.

Experiment and observation tells me that an animal will always produce what they are, not what they aren't. I haven't seen anything contrary to this yet...and I doubt if I went back in time that I would see the animals of the past do something that the animals of the present haven't been observed doing.

They always produce what they aren't. Offspring aren't clones. You already admit that breeding programs work, that foxes and domestic dogs cannot interbreed, etc. Therefore, you accept all the biological mechanics necessary for evolution to exist. Just multiply it.

The common ancestor to all wolves had other related species running around that it might have been able to interbreed with or not. Those species had a common ancestor, too, and so on.

Dog kind: wolf, domestic dog, coyote, fox, dingo,jackal
Cat kind: Lion, tiger, cheetah, leopard, domestic cat, jaguar
Bear kind: grizzly, brown, polar, koala
Snake kind: Anaconda, python, boa, rattle, cobra

The list goes on and on and on.

And you've solidified the final demonstration that "kind" is completely useless, and therefore not worthy of being taken seriously in scientific inquiry.

A cobra isn't a single snake species, but is cognate with "great ape", in that there's many of them.

Lions are as closely related to domestic cats as we are to gorillas or chimpanzees.

Koalas aren't bears; the only relation they have to bears is the fact that both are mammals. We are actually more closely related to bears than Koalas are. Koalas are a marsupial, which means they're relatives are kangaroos and the (maybe) extinct Tasmanian Tiger (which is NOT a tiger, or a cat of any sort).

This sort of categorization relies strongly on vernacular, which is often inaccurate. That's why there's a scientific standard of naming, which is international.

And once again, dogs are wolves, not the other way around. Foxes are not wolves, any more than we're chimpanzees.

Ohh, reptiles didn't come from birds? So what the heck do you think the achaeoteryx was, or was "supposed" to be? Where do you the whole theory was behind that whole scam? What do you think the presupposition was behind that scam?? Huh?

What's archaeopteryx got to do with anything?

I find Genesis 1 completely incompatible with the ToE, but to each his own.

Either way, it has no place in scientific inquiry, any more than Voluspa does.

More fairy tales. I thought the whole "fairy tale" thing was something only distinct to theists?

Another thing you don't understand: what a fairy tale is. I don't even like it when anti-theists compare Lore to fairy tales, but at least they're comparing a type of story to another type of story. And at least the Lore I follow actually has fairies!

If this is a fairy tale, where's the setup, conflict, and resolution?

 

[Riverwolf]

There are many versions of the argument, the one I hold to is the Modal version. Give me refutation of that.

Are you talking about this one:

Philosophy of Religion » The Modal Ontological Argument

That is broken down thus:

(1) If God exists then he has necessary existence.
(2) Either God has necessary existence, or he doesn‘t.
(3) If God doesn‘t have necessary existence, then he necessarily doesn‘t.
Therefore:
(4) Either God has necessary existence, or he necessarily doesn‘t.
(5) If God necessarily doesn‘t have necessary existence, then God necessarily doesn‘t exist.
Therefore:
(6) Either God has necessary existence, or he necessarily doesn‘t exist.
(7) It is not the case that God necessarily doesn‘t exist.
Therefore:
(8) God has necessary existence.
(9) If God has necessary existence, then God exists.
Therefore:
(10) God exists.

 

[idav]

Are you talking about this one:

Philosophy of Religion » The Modal Ontological Argument

That is broken down thus:

(1) If God exists then he has necessary existence.
(2) Either God has necessary existence, or he doesn‘t.
(3) If God doesn‘t have necessary existence, then he necessarily doesn‘t.
Therefore:
(4) Either God has necessary existence, or he necessarily doesn‘t.
(5) If God necessarily doesn‘t have necessary existence, then God necessarily doesn‘t exist.
Therefore:
(6) Either God has necessary existence, or he necessarily doesn‘t exist.
(7) It is not the case that God necessarily doesn‘t exist.
Therefore:
(8) God has necessary existence.
(9) If God has necessary existence, then God exists.
Therefore:
(10) God exists.

That can be broken down as "If god exists then god exists." I do think that anything that exists necessarily exists, as it would be no other way. So to say that anything here has to be.

 

[Riverwolf]

That can be broken down as "If god exists then god exists." I do think that anything that exists necessarily exists, as it would be no other way. So to say that anything here has to be.

It's definitely an example of circular logic, which would be bad enough if it weren't for the fact that it's also heavily reliant on binary reasoning, which is rarely a good way to arrive at any sort of accurate conclusion.

I mean, I broke the argument down into this:

If A then B.
Either B or C.
If C then D.
Therefore:
Either B or D.
If D then E.
Therefore:
Either B or E.
E is false.
Therefore:
B.
If B, then A.
Therefore:
A.

And then further simplified it to this:

If A then B.
Either B or !B. (C = !B; !x = not x)
If !B then |!B|. (D = |!B|; |x| = absolutely x)
Therefore:
Either B or |!B|.
If |!B| then |!B|. (E = D)
Therefore:
Either B or |!B|.
|!B| is false.
Therefore:
B.
If B, then A.
Therefore:
A.

This is broken on SO many levels it's not even funny.

I should run this through a computer program and see what comes out.

 

[AndromedaRXJ]

Ok so let me break it down for you again...when I talk about the absurdities of an actual infinite...I mean it in terms of quantity...you can never reach infinity by successive addition (counting 1 by 1), and you can never have an infinite number of things, like baseball cards or marbles. This absurdity is easily demonstrated. But when we talk about God being infinite, it is not in the same way...we mean it in a qualitive since....as God is the ultimate source of power, presence, knowledge, and goodness...with each attribute maxed out to its highest degree..it is the quality of his being, not the quantity....those are two different contexts.

You've made this plenty clear. Doesn't matter. If God doesn't have quantitative infinite power, he has limitations that go beyond just the logically impossible(four-sided triangles etc...). If he does have quantitative power, then he's a contradiction to the point you keep trying to make.

Infinite power =/= omnipotent, even though it sounds like it.

Omnipotent means there's literally nothing he can't do, including the logically impossible. Infinite power means there's an infinite amount of things he can do, but that doesn't mean there isn't anything he can't do.

i.e. if we took the time to try and count the amount of abilities and skills someone with infinite power has, we'd never stop counting. We can subtract any skill from this entity(peach gardening for instance). Now this person can't grow peaches. But there's an infinite amount of other things he can do, therefor, he has infinite power.

Your God, even subtracting the ability to do the logically impossible, is still described to have infinite ability, quantitatively speaking. So take your pick. Either you're bias and give your God the exception of infinity, or your point doesn't hold.

I see plenty of evidence for God, and not just any old God, but the Christian one. The way I look at it, theism is more plausible than naturalism.

I just can't believe

that inanimate matter suddenly came to life, and began talking, eating, reproducing, and thinking. Not only is there currently no scientific evidence for this (abiogenesis), but defies my intuition.

Your evidence against that is you simply can't believe?

Also, I'd hardly call the "non-living" inanimate. I think the weather system, geology of Earth, stars, galaxies and chemical interactions are very much animate.

"Came to life" is subjective. I could describe the things I mention above as being alive, in some sense.

Eating is just taking in matter and using it as energy, or converting the energy of it. Your car "eats" gas, in a sense, but okay, those are man-made. White Dwarf stars, in a sense, eat other stars when they form type Ia supernovae.

Reproducing might be the only exception, but again, one would argue that stars reproduce. Massive ones blow up sending shockwaves through stellar clouds which causes more stars to form.

Thinking may be another exception, but if we try to break down what thinking really is, it might not be. I think it really just breaks down to reacting to environmental stimuli, and basic chemicals do that.

I think about the big bang singularity...at which there is no life, consciousness, etc...no intelligent design whatsoever...no thoughts, no life...I just cannot get myself to believe that you can go from that...to consciously thinking and living human beings.

You're using subjective terms to begin with. Things like life, consciousness and intelligence are subjective.

So, people that aren't as of yet born, but will be born in the future already exist in the future, despite the fact that they are not born yet, but will be in the future?

Maybe. All I'm saying is, you can't rule it out.

Exactly, and events take place in terms of earlier than and later than sequences...at which a natural number can be placed on each event in numerical order...and in order for a distance number/event to be reached, an infinite number/events had to be traversed...

And I say this isn't necessarily true, because I didn't have to traverse all the existing time in the universe to reach the events of today.

Unless you can prove me wrong that I indeed traversed billions of years to get to today, you're wrong.

No escape...no matter how you want to dance around it, the absurdity isn't going anywhere. It is like a pimple from hell...no matter how many times you pop it, it just keeps coming back.

Good thing there's probably no hell then.

If the argument was that God existed in infinite time, then I would agree, but since that isn't the argument, I don't

Infinite power, infinite knowledge... etc. He's supposedly got other infinities.

Looks to me like I just did.

So in a short sentence, what's doing the traversing?

I am talking about events in time, and I thought I made that point very clear based on the amount of times I've used the word "events" since we have been having this discussion.

So events in time moves, but time itself doesn't?

Tomorrow(the 26th), for instance, isn't an event. It's a segment of time. So the 26th isn't approaching, but the event of the 26th are? But the events are always gonna be in the segment of time we call the 26th.

WWII will always stay in the early 1900s. It will never move to 3000 AD.

The argument isn't dependent upon time dilation. Infinity cannot be reached or posessed no matter how you view time or the speed of motion.

It's to explain that events in time and time it self don't move. We move through time, hence why we're able to move through time at different rates if we have different inertial reference frames(see Special and General Relativity on inertial frames).

So if WE are the only things moving through time, then I again, reiterate the point that WE did not have to traverse billions of years to get to our birth. Which means we wouldn't have to traverse infinity to get to our births in an infinite universe.

No, but what I have is analogies at which absurdities can be demonstrated, and if it can't happen in an analogy, then it can't happen in reality.

Your analogies haven't been very good.

It does. I mean it is simple, and I have to get all of this dancing, stalling, over-analyzing from you and others. This only confirms the argument for what it is, fire-proof.

Well telling yourself something because it makes you feel good, doesn't make it more true.

First off, I didn't ask "How many days/seconds would YOU have to traverse"...I asked "how many seconds lead up to this present day". You are not included anywhere in the question, so this is just another clear example of your straw mans.

You're saying infinite time can't exist because it can't be traversed. So what has to do the traversing to begin with?

Very little.

Very little as in nothing at all, or you really mean you know a little? From the little knowledge you have about them, what can you tell me about erv markers?

So the animal known as a "whale" used to walk on land? A whale cannot survive on land today, can it? So please explain how a whale would evolve a completely different respiratory system to allow it to dwell strickly in water now? Not only how, but why? Why the sudden change? You don't see the trial and error process?

I wouldn't exactly say their respiratory system is "completely" different.

I mean they have to come up to the surface and breath air, then hold their breath when they submerge.

Based on your knowledge of whale, why do you think their respiratory system is completely different?

If their skeletons are exactly the same, also the teeth, then one of their hindlimbs wouldn't be longer than the other.

Their basic skeletal structures are the same, I should say, but their proportions are different.

Much like different breeds of dogs.

Second, any similarities involving anything could very well mean common designer. The designer could make anything creature he want, and there could be differences and similarities with all of them...how is common ancestory any better of a hypothesis than common design??

But again, there's many intermediate fossils found in time periods between ambulocetus and basiliosaurus.

If what you say is true, after ambulocetus went extinct, he made another creature slightly more similar to basilosaurus. After that creature went extinct, he made yet another creature even more similar to basiliosaurus. Then after that creature went extinct, he kept repeating that until he brough basiliosaurus into existence.

This is what I mean by, if Intelligent Design is true, God made it look like Evolution happened.

It doesn't to me.

Because you don't bother to look or learn. You really don't have any knowledge of prehistoric creatures. You hardly(if at all) know what erv markers are. You don't know much about living(non-extinct) animals either. You don't know genetics. You don't know homology or comparitive anatomy.

 

[Sapiens]

...
So the animal known as a "whale" used to walk on land? A whale cannot survive on land today, can it? So please explain how a whale would evolve a completely different respiratory system to allow it to dwell strickly in water now? Not only how, but why? Why the sudden change? You don't see the trial and error process?

Actually whales are something that I am a bit of an expert on. I worked as a killer whale trainer in College and also had a work study job recovering marine mammal carcasses off the beach and determining the cause of death. I also helped a group of scientists who were looking into marine mammal phylogeny by supplying them with blood and tissues samples of most of the species I came across.

With the exception of the moving the internal nares to the top of the skull whales respiratory system is not particularly remarkable. There is a system of blood vessels that permits the animal to shunt blood into the thoracic cavity, but this system is there to prevent tissue damage due to "squeeze" as the whale dives.

Here Scientific American explains about the squeeze adaptations.

Other major adaptations are in the blood proteins, especially the oxygen loading curves for hemoglobin and myoglobin. Whales have a much higher level of hemoglobin and the loading curve is much like that of a fetal human.

Skeletal changes are clear, with the modification of the forelimbs into paddles and the loss of the hind limbs and pelvic girdle, though sometimes useless rudimentary structures remain.

Other adaptations in include changes to the teach, the development of insulating blubber, eco-location, etc.

It is interesting to note the similarity in shape and overall body plan when one compares whales, ichtyosaurs and sharks. This is what is known as convergent or parallel adaptation.

Whales evolved from a common ancestor with the hippo, this is well reviewed here

If their skeletons are exactly the same, also the teeth, then one of their hindlimbs wouldn't be longer than the other. Second, any similarities involving anything could very well mean common designer. The designer could make anything creature he want, and there could be differences and similarities with all of them...how is common ancestory any better of a hypothesis than common design??

It doesn't to me.

There is ample evidence that if it is common design it is crappy design work. Baleen whales grow teeth first as embryos. The torturous movement of the internal nares in the fetal skull, not to mention the useless pelvic bones and occasional hind legs. If I had to have a god he, she, or it would do a better and cleaner job of it.

 

[SkepticThinker]

if their skeletons are exactly the same, also the teeth, then one of their hindlimbs wouldn't be longer than the other. Second, any similarities involving anything could very well mean common designer. The designer could make anything creature he want, and there could be differences and similarities with all of them...how is common ancestory any better of a hypothesis than common design??



It doesn't to me.

genetics

See posts 594 and 595.
Or read some scientific literature for a change.

 

[MD]

Can't believe this thread is still going on and on and on